1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an apparatus for preforming a friction material for a brake.
2. Related Art
Conventionally, the preforming of a friction material of the type described has been effected by a manual operation. More specifically, conventionally, a friction material is manually charged into an intermediate die member receiving a lower die member therein, and the friction material received in the intermediate die member in a heaped-up manner is generally leveled. Then, bars are pushed into the thus leveled friction material so as to force the friction material into recessed formed in the lower die member. Then, the lower and intermediate die members are connected integrally with each other, and are transferred to a pressing machine, and then the friction material is pressed by an upper die member fitted in the intermediate die member, so that the friction material is preformed into a predetermined shape.
However, since the operation of this conventional preforming method is manually carried out, the efficiency of the operation is not satisfactory. And besides, during the preforming operation, the operator must directly touch the friction material containing asbestos which is a harmful material. Thus, the operator is exposed to such bad environment.